Today, Counterpath launched a hosted service that enables wireline operators to deliver voice and SMS to any mobile phone on any mobile network. Their NCG Exchange product gives telcos, cable operators, hosted VoIP providers, Internet Telephony service providers, CLECs and other Wireline Operators with a cost-effective solution for enabling Over-the-Top, Fixed-Mobile Services. One of the features includes Voice Call Continuity (VCC), which Counterpath's Todd Carothers demonstrated to me at ITEXPO.

With NCG Exchange, wireline operators can immediately provide their enterprise, SMB and SOHO customers with mobile VoIP and messaging services that are delivered over-the-top (OTT) of mobile networks, regardless of which carrier the customer uses.

Now normally you wouldn't want to use a corded phone to make VoIP calls and be chained to a 6 foot corded talk distance. That is unless of course you want to feel the nostalgia of the early 1980s (and earlier) by using a rotary corded phone to make VoIP calls. Tyler Brainerd found an old Model 500 rotary phone at Goodwill, which he then turned into a handset for his computer.

He explained, "I am a rather heavy google voice user, and I was thrilled when google implemented calling through gmail, except for one thing. I use a desktop, which has only a token crap webcam, and not a decent microphone at all.

I logged onto my computer this morning to be greeted with a message saying "Skype has stopped working", i.e.:

Skype has never crashed on me. Well, not in the last 4 years or so I should say. I quickly learned there was a widespread outage with users unable to logon.

[Update: I'm basing my initial word choice 'widespread' based on Twitter users' tweets and the fact that my account got hit out of the millions of Skype users. A Skype spokesperson said it was not a widespread problem.

Skype for Asterisk will not be available for sale or activation after July 26, 2011.

Skype for Asterisk was developed by Digium in cooperation with Skype. It includes proprietary software from Skype that allows Asterisk to join the Skype network as a native client. Skype has decided not to renew the agreement that permits us to package this proprietary software. Therefore Skype for Asterisk sales and activations will cease on July 26, 2011.

This change should not affect any existing users of Skype for Asterisk.

Tomorrow, CounterPath Corporation will announce their ITSP Partner Program for mobile softphones. Internet Telephony Service Providers (ITSPs) will now be able to certify their service with CounterPath's Bria iPhone Edition Softphone and an added benefit is simplified provisioning for customers. (i.e.

Blue Jeans Network has been quietly developing a new cloud-based video conferencing and collaboration service that bridges H.323 and SIP end-points, PSTN — and even Skype, with the goal of allowing users to connect everything from high-end video telepresence systems like Tandberg/Cisco and Lifesize to web cams running Skype to desktop IP videophones from Polycom, Grandstream, Cisco, and others. This solves a major problem with video conferencing and telepresence since interoperability, while it has improved, still doesn't take into account legacy H.323 end-points or users that only have inexpensive webcams. Blue Jeans Network plans to support Google and Microsoft Lync as well. Their cloud-based service handles the transcoding of audio and video codecs as well as manages the meeting IDs, PINs, etc.

Imagine being able to carry a PC on your keychain, well imagine no more! David Braben a game developer invented a skeletal computer on a USB stick that runs Linux (Ubuntu), and gets you connected to the Internet. This tiny USB stick PC sports a HDMI port on one end and a USB port on the other. It comes equipped with a decent 700 MHz ARM 11 processor, 128 MB of RAM, a USB port, support 1080p video and the ability to add a webcam or WiFi module.

I recently griped about the lack of native VoIP on the popular Facebook website. It's such an obvious lacking feature, that one has to go "hmmm... Why don't they have VoIP?" Surely, they must be secretly developing VoIP. Well, what if Facebook has been in secret negotiations to leverage Skype as the primary VoIP vehicle on the Facebook platform?

Viber today announced Viber, a mobile VoIP app was available for the Android. Viber lets users make free phone calls and send free text messages with their mobile phone. I've written about Viber in the past, but didn't initially see the convenience factor of using a person's regular phone number to dial someone using Viber. That is, the Viber dialer would automatically detect if the other person is also a Viber user to route the call.